"English, utterly English! Nothing on God's earth could be more English than this whole collection. The personality of the artist (it happened that he was an Irishman), the countenances of the subjects, their dress, the discreetly suggestive backgrounds, all have the characteristic touch of British culture, very refined, very high-bred, very quiet, very much clarified, very confident, very neat, very well-appointed, a little dreamy and just a little wearisome—the precise qualities which at the same time impress and annoy us in the English."
This is exactly what might be said of Pater's writing, but that is full-grown English. Pater is not a model for children, they would find him more than "just a little wearisome." If anyone could put into words what Sir Joshua Reynolds' portraits of children express, that would be exactly what we want for the model of their English. They can write and they can speak in a beautiful way of their own if they are allowed a little liberty to grow wild, and trained a little to climb. Their charm is candour, as it is the charm of Sir Joshua's portraits, with a quiet confidence that all is well in the world they know, and that everyone is kind; this gives the look of trustful innocence and unconcern. Their writing and talking have this charm, as long as nothing has happened to make them conscious of themselves. But these first blossoms drop off, and there is generally an intermediate stage in which they can neither speak nor write, but keep their thoughts close, and will not give themselves away. Only when that stage is past do they really and with full consciousness seek to express themselves, and pay some attention to the self-expression of others. This third stage has its May-day, when the things which have become hackneyed to our minds from long use come to them with the full force of revelations, and they astonish us by their exuberant delight. But they have a right to their May-day and it ought not to be cut short; the sun will go down of itself, and then June will come in its own time and ripen the green wood, and after that will come pruning time, in another season, and then the phase of severity and fastidiousness, and after that—if they continue to write—they will be truly themselves.
In every stage we have our duty to do, encouraging and pruning by turns, and, as in everything else, we must begin with ourselves and go on with ourselves that there may be always something living to give, and some growth; for in this we need never cease to grow, in knowledge, in taste, and in critical power. The means are not far to seek; if we really care about these things, the means are everywhere, in reading the best things, in taking notes, in criticising independently and comparing with the best criticism, in forming our own views and yet keeping a willingness to modify them, in an attitude of mind that is always learning, always striving, always raising its standard, never impatient but permanently dissatisfied.
We have three spheres of action in the use of the language—there is English to speak, English to write, And the wide field of English to read, and there are vital interests bound up in each for the after life of children. As they speak, so will be the tone of their intercourse; as they write, so will be the standard of their habits of thought; and as they read so will be the atmosphere of their life, and the preparation of their judgment for those critical moments of choice which are the pivots upon which its whole action moves.
If practice alone would develop it to perfection, speaking ought to be easy to learn, but it does not prove so, and especially when children are together in schools the weeds grow faster than the crop, and the crop is apt to be thin. The language of the majority holds its own; children among children can express with a very small vocabulary what they want to say to each other, whereas an only child who lives with its elders has usually a larger vocabulary than it can manage, which makes the sayings of only children quaint and almost weird, as the perfection of the instrument persuades us that there is a full-grown thought within it, and a child's fancy suddenly laughs at us from under the disguise.
There is general lamentation at present because the art of conversation has fallen to a very low ebb; there is, in particular, much complaint of the conversation of girls whose education is supposed to have been careful. The subjects they care to talk of are found to be few and poor, their power of expressing themselves very imperfect, the scanty words at their command worked to death in supplying for all kinds of things to which they are not appropriate. We know that we have a great deal of minted gold in the English language, but little of it finds its way into our general conversation, most of our intercourse is carried on with small change, a good deal of it even in coppers, and the worst trouble of all is that so few seem to care or to regret it. Perhaps the young generation will do so later in life, but unless something is done for them during the years of their education it does not seem probable, except in the case of the few who are driven by their professional work to think of it, or drawn to it by some influence that compels them to exert themselves in earnest.
Listening to the conversation of girls whose thoughts and language are still in a fluid state, say from the age of 17 to 25, gives a great deal of matter for thought to those who are interested in education, and this point of language is of particular interest. There are the new catch-words of each year; they had probably a great piquancy in the mouth of the originator but they very soon become flat by repetition, then they grow jaded, are more and more neglected and pass away altogether. From their rising to their setting the arc is very short—about five years seems to be the limit of their existence, and no one regrets them. We do not seem to be in a happy vein of development at present as to the use of words, and these short-lived catch-words are generally poor in quality. Our girl talkers are neither rich nor independent in their language, they lay themselves under obligations to anyone who will furnish a new catch-word, and especially to boys from whom they take rather than accept contributions of a different kind. It is an old-fashioned regret that girls should copy boys instead of developing themselves independently in language and manners; but though old-fashioned, it will never cease to be true that what was made to be beautiful on its own line is dwarfed and crippled by straining it into imitation of something else which it can never be.
What can be done for the girls to give them first more independence in their language and then more power to express themselves? Probably the best cure, food and tonic in one, is reading; a taste for the best reading alters the whole condition of mental life, and without being directly attacked the defects in conversation will correct themselves. But we could do more than is often done for the younger children, not by talking directly about these things, but by being a little harder to please, and giving when it is possible the cordial commendation which makes them feel that what they have done was worth working for.
Recitation and reading aloud, besides all their other uses, have this use that they accustom children to the sound of their own voices uttering beautiful words, which takes away the odd shyness which some of them feel in going beyond their usual round of expressions and extending their vocabulary. We owe it to our language as well as to each individual child to make recitation and reading aloud as beautiful as possible. Perhaps one of the causes of our conversational slovenliness is the neglect of these; critics of an older generation have not ceased to lament their decay, but it seems as if better times were coming again, and that as the fundamentals of breathing and voice-production are taught, we shall increase the scope of the power acquired and give it more importance. There is a great deal underlying all this, beyond the acquirement of voice and pronunciation. If recitation is cultivated there is an inducement to learn by heart; this in its turn ministers to the love of reading and to the formation of literary taste, and enriches the whole life of the mind. There is an indirect but far-reaching gain of self-possession, from the need for outward composure and inward concentration of mind in reciting before others. But it is a matter of importance to choose recitations so that nothing should be learnt which must be thrown away, nothing which is not worth remembering for life. It is a pity to make children acquire what they will soon despise when they might learn something that they will grow up to and prize as long as they live. There are beautiful things that they can understand, if something is wanted for to-day, which have at the same time a life that will never be outgrown. There are poems with two aspects, one of which is acceptable to a child and the other to the grown-up mind; these, one is glad to find in anthologies for children. But there are many poems about children of which the interest is so subtle as to be quite unsuitable for their collection. Such a poem is "We are seven." Children can be taught to say it, even with feeling, but their own genuine impression of it seems to be that the little girl was rather weak in intellect for eight years old, or a little perverse. Whereas Browning's "An incident of the French camp" appeals to them by pride of courage as it does to us by pathos. It may not be a gem, poetically speaking, but it lives. As children grow older it is only fair to allow them some choice in what they learn and recite, to give room for their taste to follow its own bent; there are a few things which it is well that every one should know by heart, but beyond these the field is practically without limits.
Perfect recitation or reading aloud is very rare and difficult to acquire. For a few years there was a tendency to over-emphasis in both, and, in recitation, to teach gesture, for which as a nation we are singularly inapt. This is happily disappearing, simplicity and restraint are regaining their own, at least in the best teaching for girls. As to reading aloud to children it begins to be recognized that it should not be too explicit, nor too emphatic, nor too pointed; that it must leave something for the natural grace of the listener's intelligence to supply and to feel. There is a didactic tone in reading which says, "you are most unintelligent, but listen to ME and there may yet be hope that you will understand." This leaves the "poor creatures" of the class still unmoved and unenlightened; "the child is not awakened," while the more sensitive minds are irritated; they can feel it as an impertinence without quite knowing why they are hurt. It is a question of manners and consideration which is perceptible to them, for they like what is best—sympathy and suggestiveness rather than hammering in. They can help each other by their simple insight into these things when they read aloud, and if a reading lesson in class is conducted as an exercise in criticism it is full of interest. The frank good-nature and gravity of twelve-year-old critics makes their operations quite painless, and they are accepted with equal good humour and gravity, no one wasting any emotion and a great deal of good sense being exchanged.